


Where I'd Be (Without You)

by rozabellalove



Category: Supernatural
Genre: F/M, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-09-22
Updated: 2011-09-22
Packaged: 2017-10-23 23:04:31
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 1
Words: 13,945
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/256070
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rozabellalove/pseuds/rozabellalove
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The lives of Sam and Dean Winchester are a little unusual to say the least. One day they're playing practical jokes on each other, messing around. The next they're hunting a creature that leaves Sam infected by a curious venom that makes him irresistible to anyone that sets eyes on him. The term beating them off with a stick has never been quite so literal. It's nice of Dean to try and resist the pull of the venom, but everyone has a weak spot, and for Dean, it's Sam.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Where I'd Be (Without You)

It wasn’t often that Sam was happy to just let the time between hunts drag on for more than a few days, but the summer was long and hot, and the supernatural world was eerily quiet. Dean had found them a motel that was smack bang between a heavy metal club and a foreign-language movie theater - a rare combination that had kept them both out of each other’s hair for a few nights, making them happier than usual in the days. For once they were happy to just spend time in each other’s company without the frequent tension that built up when they were in each other’s pockets for too long.

Perched on the bed, Sam browsed through one of Chuck’s instalments of their lives in print. They’d found the rare copy in a dusty old bookshop in a backstreet of the last town. Dean was lazily tapping at Sam’s laptop, no doubt on one of his favorite porn sites, trying to figure a way to get to the good stuff without actually paying for it. Sam wasn’t about to look over Dean’s shoulder again. He knew that his brother had kinks; he just didn’t need to see them splayed out in all their widescreen glory across his beloved laptop.

The first laugh was a teaser, Dean’s ‘I’ve found something funny. Ask me what it is’ laugh. Sam knew better than to respond, staying infuriatingly silent in the corner, eyes glued to the pages of the only slightly battered book. The second laugh was louder, accompanied by Dean throwing back his head and slapping his knee. Sam could ignore it but it would only get worse, and eventually Dean would just outright tell him anyway.

“What?” He kept his voice flat, as if he wasn’t really interested.

“C’mere, look at this.” Dean immediately grinned and turned in his seat to wave Sam over, completely ignoring Sam‘s disinterested tone. “My fine is one thousand and twenty dollars!”

“Huh?” Sam stood slowly and began to walk over to where Dean sat, intrigued, “Your fine for what? Parking fines? They can’t charge you that much, that’s not-”

Dean cut in, “No, Sam, come over and see.” He turned the monitor so Sam could see the site.

 _Just a fun little game!! Okay, read the 'offence' and if you've done it, you owe that fine. You don't have to confess your answers, just the amount of your fine.  
*Fines are to be added once, not for however many times you have done it.*_

Smoked weed - $10  
Did acid or pills - $5  
Had sex at church - $25  
Had sex in a pool - $20  
Kissed someone of the same sex - $10  
Woke up in the morning and did not know the person who was next to you - $40  
Had sex with someone on MySpace/Facebook/Bebo etc - $25  
Had sex for money - $100  
Had sex with a Puerto Rican - $20...

The list went on for a lot longer, but it wasn’t more than a page. Sam quickly tallied up the total possible fine in his head, it was around eleven hundred dollars. “And your fine’s **one thousand and twenty dollars**?!” He knew his jaw was hanging slack, but couldn’t quite bring himself to close it when Dean was sat there looking so smug. “Seriously? You’ve done…pretty much everything on that list?”

“Well, I’ve never had sex with a Puerto Rican. At least, I don’t think so. There was this one chick, but she was from… Shit. No, my fine’s a thousand forty five. She **was** Puerto Rican. So was her twin sister.” His grin widening, Dean nodded, the self-satisfied smirk becoming more unbearable by the minute. “Uh, I don’t even know what a Bebo is, so I guess I’ve never done that. Never fell in love with a stripper either, or any of the love ones. So, what’s your fine?” It might have just been sheer curiosity, but Dean looked keen to find out, as if there was something he could tell from Sam’s answer.

Sam could have guessed that his would be lower than Dean’s, but it wasn’t until he began to add it up that he realized how lame his looked next to his brother’s. “Uh…It’s, um, four hundred and ten dollars.”

“Yeah, that’s about what I guessed.” Dean’s grin somehow became even wider, until the laughter lines around his face threatened to eat his eyes.

“You guessed? You mean you added up what you thought I’d done?” Sam didn’t know why, but he was enraged. So Dean thought he knew everything about Sam? Well, Dean was wrong.

Finger running down the side of the list, Dean turned back to him to say, “Wasn’t that hard, Sammy. There are things on here you’d never do. They’re just not you.”

“Like what? Come on, tell me.” He let his hand fall heavily on the table, making the laptop shudder against the wood.

“Whoa, no need to get all demanding there, Sam. S’just a game. Okay, let’s see, ‘Kissed someone whose name you didn’t know’, ten dollars. Dude, I’ve seen you with chicks. No way you’re gonna get anywhere near ‘em without knowing their name. It’s cool, lots of chicks dig that whole _interested in you for you_ , thing that you got going on.” The patronising tone of Dean’s voice had his blood boiling worse than ever.

“Right. Fine.”

Dean’s shit-eating grin finally gave way to something a little more hesitant, “Dude, I know that look. What’s going on? What are you planning?”

It was Sam’s turn to grin, eyes wide. “Oh, you’ll see.” He stalked into the bathroom and slammed the door behind him.

~*~

The bar was hot and packed out, full of sweaty, pale guys and half-dressed girls slathered in dark make-up. Everyone was wearing some shade of black or grey, with the occasional splashes of blood red and blue denim. Sam had made sure he wouldn’t look too out of place, leaving his beloved flannel at home for once and dragging out a simple black t-shirt, dark jeans and boots. The t-shirt was a little shorter than he‘d normally wear, it was one of Dean‘s old Metallica ones, but he needed to fit in.

Dean would be in there somewhere, but for the moment Sam had other plans. The music was at least familiar, even if it wasn’t really his scene. Thankful at last for the fact that Dean would only listen to classic Dad rock in the Impala, Sam knocked back a couple of shots and made his way to the dance floor.

It didn’t take much to move with the beat. As the alcohol began to buzz through his system, and Sam really let himself go, he realized he was actually enjoying himself. A cute, petite brunette was making eyes at him, hips moving in languid figure-eights as she made her way over to where he danced. She flashed him a quick smile and began to lean up as if to speak to him, but Sam had other ideas.

Reaching down, he pulled her in tight and lifted her up so she was on tiptoes. She made a little sound as if surprised, but made no move to back away, leaning into Sam’s kiss instead. He was just beginning to pull back when he felt the tip of her tongue darting across his lips. For a moment he was still going to just put her down and walk away, until he realized that Dean wouldn’t even really count this as a kiss unless there was some serious tongue involved. The girl was malleable and eager. Something about the fact that he didn’t know a single thing about her made the whole experience much more exciting.

Sam’s neck began to ache from leaning too far to kiss the girl. Wrapping his arms around her without thinking, he lifted her up until she was dangling off the floor. Her legs locked around his waist and he walked her over to the nearest wall. She was a good kisser - soft, warm lips, not too much tongue - but when she pulled back to breathe, and gazed at him with a look of full-blown awe, Sam knew it was time to put her down.

“Sorry, I gotta-” He almost dropped her in his haste to get away, and hurried off to the men’s bathroom.

Inside the stall, Sam congratulated himself. He’d done it. That would show Dean. Except it wouldn’t, because Dean would never believe him, not without proof. He knew that it didn’t really matter if Dean actually saw it anyway. He’d still done it. But a niggling little part of him wanted to show off his conquest, wanted to prove Dean’s stupid assumptions wrong.

By the time he got out of the bathroom the girl was gone, but she was still in the club, waiting at the bar for a drink. Sam quickly scanned the room and spotted his brother at the other end of the bar, chatting to some grungy looking guys with plenty of piercings and tattoos. He cut in behind the brunette and slipped his hands down to wrap around her waist, saying “Sorry, had to take care of something,” in her ear. She turned and gave him a fake-annoyed look, pouting in a way that would have made lesser men drop to their knees and beg for forgiveness. She was about to speak when Sam cut her off with another kiss, turning her words into a breathy moan instead.

He pulled back and took her hand, walking away from the queue at the bar and taking her towards where Dean stood with the same group of guys. Once again he leaned down to her ear, telling her he was taking her to meet his brother.

Dean’s face was a mixture of shock and worry as he caught sight of Sam stalking over, the small girl being pulled behind him, unable to keep up with his long strides. “Sam, what the…something wrong?”

“Nope. I just wanted you to meet my new friend, uh,” He turned to her, deliberately making a show of the fact that he didn’t know her name, “Sorry, sweetheart, what’s your name?”

She didn’t look at all bothered and piped up, “I’m Lily.”

Dean gave her an appraising look and smiled, only faltering a little when she still seemed completely smitten with Sam. “Nice to meet you, Lily. Hey, would you be a doll and just grab us a coupla beers? Get yourself a drink too. Need to have a word with my bro’ here about something.”

“Sure.” She nodded, taking the bill he passed to her and heading for the least packed part of the bar.

Sam grinned as soon as she was gone, trying not to look too self-satisfied. Failing miserably. “So?”

“So you’re going for more than one off the list tonight, huh?” Dean gave him a look that almost got to _concerned_ , but stalled at _amused_. When Sam didn’t respond, Dean raised his eyebrows, “Had sex with someone under half your age plus five years? She’s still in her teens, Sam.”

Sam froze. She was only a few years younger than him, but the age difference made him feel dirty. Glancing back at her, he could see the way she nervously clutched her ID as she asked for the beers. As if she knew it might not get accepted. He turned back to find Dean saying goodbye to the guys he was chatting with. Leading him quickly out the back of the club, Dean shook his head and smirked the whole time.

~*~

The walk back to the motel was only a short one, but Dean decided to drag it out for as long as possible, forcing Sam to speak to him to ask him to hurry the fuck up. He didn’t get it, the girl was hot. Sure she was young, but she wasn’t underage. Hell, if he’d spotted her first, he might have given it a shot himself. The only reason he’d brought it up was because Sam seemed so oblivious. Whatever Dean might say, the truth was he just did have more experience than Sam, but it was nothing that either of them should be ashamed of.

He didn’t understand why Sam got so worked up about this stuff. Half the stuff on the list was nowhere near as weird as things they did every day on random hunts. A pretty big chunk of the stuff he’d done from that list was actually _for_ a hunt.

Sam’s moral compass had always pointed towards ‘boring’, whereas Dean’s swung wildly around, depending on how he felt on the day. When Sam had gone to Stanford, Dean had assumed that a certain amount of sexual experimentation would happen. That Sam would just loosen up a bit, but the moment he’d found out about Jessica, Dean had realized Sam was still playing it safe.

This time, Dean was determined to teach his little brother to relax and enjoy some of the naughtier things in life, while at the same time retaining his title as the most debauched of the two.

Sam shoved him through the motel door and slammed it behind them, leaning against it and breathing as if he’d just done a cross-country run.

Dean couldn’t resist, “If you want, we can go find some strippers. You can make some real headway on your fine-”

“Very funny, Dean. Besides, I’ve given money to strippers before. Doesn’t count if you’re just doing things twice.” Sam had the worst of his bitchfaces on. Dean could choose to make it worse or to just stop right there and not antagonize him anymore.

“Yeah, but you’ve never fallen in love with one, right? That’s another twenty dollars right there!” He kept an innocent look on his face the whole time, and just about managed to duck when Sam launched one of those clown-sized boots towards him, “I’m just saying…”

~*~

Sam felt bad about what he’d done to the girl, not kissing her, but leaving her there without an explanation. She wasn‘t exactly his type, but that shouldn‘t really matter. Then Dean told him that he’d given the girl a fifty to get the drinks, so she’d probably had a good night, and Sam felt even worse. Even more dirty. Once again Dean’s smug grin made an appearance. Sam resolved once more to make him pay for it.

He flipped open the laptop and tabbed back to the site where Dean had found the dreaded list. At first he was simply adding up the things he thought he could do to get one over on Dean and get his fine up to a more respectable level. As he scanned through the list, he began to realize that there were certain things Dean had to have done in order to have such a high fine. There was a hundred-dollar fine for having sex for money. He knew Dean had paid for sex, but it was impossible for Dean to have such a high fine unless he’d also **been** paid for sex.

Dean had already admitted that the falling in love ones and the Facebook/MySpace/Bebo ones didn’t apply to him, which meant…that Dean had kissed, flirted with, and maybe even had sex with ‘someone of the same sex’.

The door bursting open was just bad timing. Sam startled away from the laptop with a guilty-looking jump. Dean gave him a look that said he knew what Sam had been up to, and tossed a couple of greasy bags of diner breakfast onto the table. “Figuring out your next move, huh? Gonna find yourself a granny next, or maybe a nice little MILF, go for the ‘ten years older’ one?”

“You’re not funny, Dean.” Sam poked at the bag of food sitting in front of him, wondering what fatty concoction Dean had picked up for them to start the day.

“Yeah, that’s the thing. I sorta am. And, well, I’ve got very loose morals, plus, I’m kinda irresistible. Which is how I’ve mmagmfle mno mmoo phmerful mer nphfesh.” Dean’s last words were severely muffled by the huge wad of bacon he was attempting to cram into his mouth. Luckily, Sam was fluent in face-full-of-food-Dean, and could translate it to ‘managed to do most of the list.’

He poked miserably at the heart attack in a bag, picking out a little corner of lean bacon to chew on, realizing that Dean was right. Sam wasn’t exactly the most straight-laced of guys, but compared to Dean he was like a poster boy for clean living. Dean also had a huge head start on him.

Sam was about to give up on the whole thing, when Dean spoke again, this time as if he was just mulling it over, “There’s something you can do that would make up a lot of ground, you know.” Despite himself, Sam’s competitive streak kicked in. He found himself sitting straighter in the chair, curious to hear what Dean would say. “You could have sex for money.” Sam sat, speechless, in front of Dean. “With a dude.”

The bacon lodged in the back of Sam’s throat as he gasped in a surprised breath. He coughed frantically and began to pound on his chest, but it was Dean’s swift Heimlich manoeuvre that had the little scrap of meat flying across the room to land with a splat on the window, sliding slowly down to land in a puddle of spit and dust. For a moment Dean held onto him - arms wrapped around his waist, groin pressed against his ass - as if Sam might need another thrust. Then he whispered in Sam’s ear, and Sam could hear the grin even if he couldn’t see it, “It wouldn’t be too different from this, Sammy. Just bend over and think of beating me.” There was silence for a moment before Dean pulled back and laughed, grabbing his greasy breakfast and slouching over to the bed to collapse in front of the TV.

~*~

It had been a step too far. Dean could see it in Sam’s eyes, the fun of the moment had turned into something else for Sam. Although Dean knew he’d only been joking - well, half joking anyway - Sam was determined to make it into a big thing between them. He hadn’t known any of this stuff would be such a big deal to Sam until this whole thing kicked off, and now it was growing into a gulf between them. Dean’s way of dealing was to lock things up into a nice tight box and bury them deep, the Winchester way. Sam, though, Sam needed to talk about things, and Dean could tell it was killing him not to just blurt it all out.

He’d thought the little game, the competition between the two of them, would be fun. Instead it turned into Sam having a bee in his bonnet about something - probably some of the sex stuff - and Dean being clueless about how to fix it.

There was only one solution. Who was he kidding? There was only _ever_ one solution. Keep moving, find another hunt. It was the way they lived their lives, the way they worked out problems. It was second nature.

“Found one.” Dean circled the article and handed the paper to Sam, before heading over to the bed to start shoving his things into the dirty, khaki duffel.

Poring through the article, Sam began to frown. “Three people missing? Two guys and a girl, in two weeks. That’s a job?”

“Usually? No. But this is in a town with a population of four hundred people, Sam. Too many for such a small town.” Dean barely looked up from his packing.

“Could just be a regular thing, though. Could be they got a killer up there. Maybe two of them ran off together and one’s…uh, I don’t know, in the hospital?” The paper waved around as Sam gestured with it, still sat on the bed, determinedly not packing.

Dean sighed and raised his eyebrows, deigning to look at Sam as he said, “No harm in checking it out, ‘less you wanna stay around here and maybe hook up with your little teenage girlfriend again?”

Sam’s duffel miraculously appeared in his hand, huge handfuls of clothes being rammed into it faster than Dean could have packed it himself.

“Yeah, that’s what I thought.”

~*~

By the time they got there two more people were missing, a guy and a girl, bringing the tally up to three men and two women. Sam grudgingly admitted that something was obviously going on. They just had to figure out whether it was their kind of thing or whether it was just a regular human crazy picking off these people for regular human shit.

Dean was definitely leaning towards it being their kind of thing. Once he’d managed to talk to some of the families and friends of the missing people, he realized that of the three missing guys, two were openly gay and one was bisexual. It didn’t add up to much, but it meant all the victims had something in common. It meant they could easily be lured in by an attractive man. They all attended the same college too. He fired off a quick text to Sam and set off for the college.

Charming the receptionist was almost too easy. Dean was in the records, checking the students’ classes, when Sam called to say he was on his way. There were a few classes that the various missing students shared with each other, but only one class they were _all_ signed up for - Mythology in Literature. The lecturer was a new addition to the college, and Dean was willing to bet he was responsible for the missing students. Why the cops hadn’t figured this out yet was anyone’s guess, but for whatever reason, they weren’t sniffing around the college.

A quick flirt with the receptionist and he had a working description of the lecturer, directions to his classroom, and the girl’s number to boot. She waved at him until she thought he was out of sight before faking a swoon for the other girls behind the desk. Dean’s bow-legged swagger became practically obscene, paired with a smug grin, in between bouts of whistling. No one could accuse Dean of under-acting - if Sam had been there he’d have been rolling his eyes.

As it was, a quick text to Sam meant that by the time Dean got to the room where the new lecturer taught Mythology in Literature, Sam was already there questioning the man. Dean took a moment to scope out the situation through the glass pane in the door, just in time to see the lecturer dart towards Sam, catching him off balance. Before Dean could rip open the door and get inside, Sam was on the floor - blood beginning to pool from a wound in his neck. He grabbed the door and yelled at the thing which suddenly leapt up and perched on the window ledge for a second. The man was small, dark haired with piercing blue eyes and golden-brown skin. Dean had enough of a glimpse to notice that there was something wrong with his face. It had changed in the seconds that the man was attacking Sam, jaw a little too long, teeth a little too pointed. Before the attack it had been gorgeous, a beautiful man. The creature screeched and leapt from the second-storey window.

Without even trying to go for the creature, Dean slid in one swift movement to his knees, scooping Sam up into his arms. Blood spurted from the wound, but even as he watched, it was already beginning to close. The edges of the wound were dark, strangely black blood pooling there, hardening to a dull looking crust on Sam’s skin. Sam’s eyes fluttered, his skin was pale and clammy.

“Sammy! Shit, Sammy stay with me, please, Sam, come on. Don’t give in to it, come on, Sam.” Dean shook him, agitatedly rocking with Sam wrapped in his arms. “Please, please, please, Sam. Come on, Sam. Don’t do this, come on. Wake up, Sammy, please!”

He shook harder as Sam’s lips began to turn blue, breathing hitching and becoming shallower as the dark poison began to soak into Sam’s system. Dean watched as the wound healed before his eyes, until it was almost closed. He made a flash decision and leaned over to suck at the rapidly closing wound. There was just enough time for him to drag out a couple of mouthfuls of thick, slimy, strangely cold blood. He spat it onto the floor between each pull, until the wound finally sealed itself. The edges were jagged and grey, knotted together like laced fingers. Dean could see where the poison was beginning to seep into Sam’s veins, a deep greyish blue color flowing under his brother’s skin.

“Sammy, stay with me, please.”

A stuttering cough burst from Sam’s throat. He turned a little in Dean’s lap and coughed again, vomiting up a small puddle of the black slime. Dean pulled him up, noticing Sam was awake and wiping at his lips with the back of his hand.

“Oh, thank God! Thank you, God. Sammy, fuck! Thought I was gonna lose you there for a sec.” Dean’s free hand fisted in Sam’s shirt, his other hand supported Sam’s head. “Don’t ever scare me like that again. You shoulda waited for me.”

Sam spluttered and wiped at his mouth, grimacing and clawing at his tongue to get rid of the foul-tasting mess. “Girl… was a girl in here. ‘lone. He was…I thought…”

“I get it. She was shaping up to be the next victim, huh?”

Sam nodded, “Had to come in, get her out…”

“Okay, forget that now, let’s get you up and outta here. Soon as we get back I’m calling Bobby. This shit is fucked up.” He hefted Sam’s arm over his shoulder, trying not to notice the way his brother’s head lolled away from him. The wound on his neck was fading, but it was still raised and ugly, skin discolored and pale.

They made it to the Impala without being stopped. It was parked directly in front of the classroom’s windows, but there was no sign of the monster that had attacked Sam. Dean bundled his brother into the seat and drove away from the college like there was a hellhound on their tail.

~*~

The ride back to the motel was shorter than Sam expected. He drifted in and out of consciousness, dreaming - or hallucinating - about cold blue eyes and a gaping mouth full of morphing, stunted fangs. He awoke, screaming and batting at his neck, gasping in short, panting breaths. Quickly, Dean was there, pulling him into the motel and slamming the door behind them.

Sam was shaking violently, even in the warm room. Strong arms pulled him close and held him in a tight grip, pinning his arms to his sides until the shaking subsided and Dean was just holding him up. The room spun as Sam’s knees gave way, the last thing he saw was a pair of deep, green eyes below a concerned frown.

“Sammy, no, not again…” The world faded away.

~*~

When he woke up, Sam found himself on top of the covers, naked except for his boxer briefs. He couldn’t quite remember why he was there, why they weren’t still on the hunt. He managed to prop himself up on his elbows before the dizziness swept across him and he dry heaved for a few moments. Dean was sat at the side of the bed, elbows on his knees, like he’d been sat there for days, as Sam convulsed through the churning in his gut. Dean eased over onto the bed and put an arm around his shoulders to support him.

“H-how long was I…?” His throat was dry, and it felt like he’d been stabbed in the neck.

“Day and a half.” Dean eased himself up, stretching stiff muscles, and went to the little refrigerator to grab a cup of ice chips. “Here.” He popped one into Sam’s mouth. “You’ve been burning up. You’ve only got the underwear on ’cause…well, you know.” Dean stared into the cup and Sam couldn’t help but let a small smile flit across his face.

The ice cooled Sam’s sore throat, melting quickly inside his mouth. “Did you speak to Bobby?” The memories were coming back, the lecturer, the bite, Dean showing up and saving him. He took a good look at Dean, it was clear he had barely left Sam’s side the whole time he was unconscious. The stubble on his jaw and chin was longer than Dean usually let it grow, and he was still wearing the same clothes he’d worn to the College. There were shadows around his red-rimmed eyes, and his clothes looked crumpled.

“Yeah.” Dean sat back down on the chair and rubbed a hand through the short hair at the back of his head. “He looked through some stuff for me. I know what it was.”

Sam reached for an ice chip, but Dean beat him to it, grabbing a couple and slipping them into Sam’s mouth for him. “Anmph?” He mumbled, around the ice.

Dean closed his eyes and sighed, “Incubus.”

“Fuck.”

“Yeah.” Dean sighed again.

Sam collapsed back onto the bed. His energy was slowly coming back, but hearing that they were facing an Incubus had him feeling hopeless. They had heard of the creatures before, the closest they’d come was with a siren a couple of years back. She’d been easy enough to kill, but they had no experiences with an Incubus and they were notoriously hard to kill, and said to be extremely dangerous. “How do we-?”

“Working on it.” Dean cut in, “Well, Bobby is anyway. It doesn’t look good, Sam. You got bitten by that sonofabitch, and we don’t know yet what the effects are. How you feeling?”

The wound on his neck itched as Sam sat up and took stock of himself. “Not as bad as I thought I would. A little dizzy, really warm, but otherwise okay. I think I could-” He swung his legs off the bed and tried to stand,

“Whoa there, Gigantor. Maybe not yet, huh?” Dean helped him sit back as the dizziness had him reeling. “You look better, though. You were really pale for a while back there. The poison or venom or whatever the hell it was, that shit was working through your veins. Could see it under the skin.” Dean traced a line along his arm and Sam shivered at the soft touch.

Sam lifted his arm up to take a look at his skin. There was nothing different about it, except that maybe he looked a little more tanned than usual, a little more radiant. He ran a hand through his hair, expecting it to be greasy and tangled, but it was smooth and thick between his fingers. He let his hand slide down to explore the bite mark on his neck. The skin was a little raised still, but it felt soft under his fingertips, painless.

His stomach growled and suddenly Sam was ravenously hungry.

~*~

The diner was almost empty, just a couple of guys at the counter and a few staff, but Dean still didn’t want to be there. At least, he didn’t want Sam to be there. He would have been quite happy to run over and get the food alone, but Sam was restless and wouldn’t stay in the room alone. The wound on his brother’s neck was almost invisible now, so Dean couldn’t understand the odd looks they were getting as they made their way across the diner and into a booth.

A waitress gave them a distracted glance before shuffling over with the menus and dropping them on the table, writing something on her order pad. Dean prepared his best below-the-lashes, coy look for her. She lifted her eyes from the pad and immediately focused on Sam. Dean waited for her gaze to fall on him, but it was as if he wasn’t even there.

“Hi sugar, what can I get ya?” She bent down a little as if to give Sam a better view of her gingham-framed cleavage.

“Short stack, please, side of bacon. Coffee, large.” Sam’s eyes never left the menu, but Dean was staring at the waitress with his mouth hanging open. She made as if to walk away and Dean had to grab her arm to give his order. She took it down distractedly and walked off, gazing over her shoulder at Sam.

The coffee materialized quickly, Sam’s poured delicately into a huge mug. Dean’s was slopped over the table while the waitress tried to keep staring at Sam. The thin napkins from the dispenser did very little for the puddle of coffee, turning it into a mushy mess of coffee and paper instead. Dean began to sulk in earnest when Sam’s food turned up with a perfect little smiley face of chocolate chips on the pancakes, and his own food was only half cooked and half right.

“Miss, can you…?” She was already gone before he could get her to bring him the right food.

Sam ate the food greedily, shovelling hunks of pancake into his mouth and moaning around the mouthfuls. Staring at him open-mouthed, Dean couldn’t even bring himself to pick at his greasy sausage special. There was something so manly about the way Sam held himself, the way he slurped at the black coffee. His goofy grin when he flipped over his napkin and found the waitress’s number was just breathtaking. Dean was mesmerized by the sheer beauty of Sam’s long, nimble fingers as he played with the food, twirling the fork with a dexterity that left Dean breathless. There was a glowing light emanating from Sam‘s skin, and a sound like a quiet angel‘s chorus hovering in the air between them.

“Dean? Hey, dude, everything okay? Dean? **Dean!** ”

Suddenly Dean shook himself. He startled as if Sam had thrown cold water over him. The radiance and singing were gone. Sam was just plain old Sam again - only as gorgeous as usual. It took Dean a second to remember whether he’d always thought of Sam as gorgeous, but before he could process the thoughts flitting through his mind, the waitress was back. This time she was touching Sam.

At first it was just brushing a crumb from his collar, but as soon as she made contact with Sam’s skin it was as if she lost the ability to _not_ touch him. Suddenly her fingers were in his hair, her eyes were glazed, and she was swinging her leg to straddle him so that she could sit in his lap. Sam froze, his usually fast reactions dulled somehow by the Incubus venom in his system. The woman was kissing him deeply before Sam got it together enough to push her off. Dean could only watch, still fuzzy from his strange moment earlier.

Sam couldn’t get her off him for long enough to stand up, it was as if whatever daze she was in was giving her extra strength. The second he pulled her away from one part of him she was suddenly clinging somewhere else, all the while trying to undress him and get as much of her skin on his as possible.

The instant Dean snapped out of his haze was the same moment that the waitress decided to try her luck getting into Sam’s underwear. Bypassing the usual method of opening the fly, she simply shoved her hand down the front of Sam’s pants, growling like a feral animal at the same time. Dean didn’t want to hurt her, but he had to get her off Sam and get them both out of there. He grasped her by the shoulders and yanked her back, unwittingly slamming her against the table.

Sam scrambled back and out of the booth, knocking over a couple of chairs as he pulled away. The waitress was still grasping for him, but Dean pinned her to the table just long enough to call out “Go! For God’s sake, just fucking go!”

Sam seemed to hesitate for a second before turning and hurrying out through the narrow diner. The couple of patrons in the place watched him go with identical expressions of hazy awe on their faces, completely ignoring Dean in favor of staring at Sam. One of the men at the counter made as if to get up, but Sam managed to make it out of the door.

As soon as he was out of sight, Sam’s impromptu fan club seemed to come to their senses. The tense atmosphere in the diner disappeared, and the waitress that Dean was straining to hold against the table sagged back, breathing heavily.

Dean was out of the door before she even realized he’d been there.

~*~

Here in the street, Sam was nowhere to be seen. The sidewalks were strangely clear. Dean walked slowly back in the direction of the motel, keeping an eye out for Sam and listening for any noise that might give him a clue. There was a scuffle and a cut-off yelp from an alley close by. He’d recognize Sam’s cry for help anywhere.

The alley was wide but full of places to hide. Dean approached cautiously, darting looks into the shadowy alcoves of doorways. When he finally found Sam, he froze in shock for a moment. His brother was being held up against a rough brick wall by one tall, stocky guy, while another tore at Sam’s fly. Both were pressed against Sam’s skin as if their lives depended on it, biting, licking and sucking every available inch.

Sam was fighting, but these guys seemed to have an incredible amount of strength. Stronger than any demon or creature they’d fought in a long time. Dean should have been analysing their movements, taking in their weak points and assessing them as targets. Instead he was overcome by a furious jealousy.

Rooted to the spot, he watched as they marked Sam’s beautiful skin, as they explored and sullied every part of Sam that he wanted for himself. He didn’t have time to think about when he’d started wanting Sam like this. It was so obvious, so blinding. Sam was _his_ , and he was the most beautiful, radiant, exquisite thing Dean had ever seen in his life.

“Dean! Help!” Sam’s voice shook him out of the reverie. Dean performed a patented Winchester technique, blocking out the disturbing thoughts he’d been having and replacing them with cold, deadly fury.

First the tall one. Dean’s chokehold brought the guy to his knees, gasping for air, eyes bulging with a look of horrified shock, until he suddenly went slack and fainted. Dean resisted the urge to land a few extra kicks and punches, but only because there was still one more to handle. Sam was trying to peel off the smaller one with little success. The man was intent on ripping off Sam’s clothes in any way possible, making a high-pitched keening sound as he rubbed himself against Sam’s groin.

Dean’s fists slammed into the guy’s sides one at a time, up and under the ribs on each side, cutting into his diaphragm, forcing the air out of his lungs. The man froze for a second and crumpled to the ground, curled in a ball but still somehow clutching at Sam’s jeans. Sam peeled off the clawed fists at his waistband and shoved past Dean, running for the entrance of the alleyway.

Dean chose not to mention the bulge at Sam’s groin, somehow knowing that this wasn‘t the time to get into it.

~*~

He slammed the motel door so hard that the walls shook, and the couple in the room next door - who insisted on having extremely loud sex at all hours - banged on the wall in protest. Dean would be back soon enough, but he needed a moment to himself to get his body under control. In the space of half an hour he’d been almost eaten alive by three people. Not women. People. A woman, yes, but two guys as well. He leaned back against the wall near the door, palms pressed flat against it for support.

His heart was pounding, sweat bursting out of his pores and covering his flushed skin. His pants were uncomfortably tight, straining against the erection he was trying desperately to ignore. Trying and failing. Flashes of the attack came back to him, hard muscles pinning him to the wall, rough stubble scraping his skin. He moaned and palmed the persistent bulge, finding scant relief, but not willing to give in to the urges that were beginning to overwhelm him.

The door opened and Dean peered inside with a caution that Sam had never seen in him before. He hesitated in the open doorway, eyes hovering at the level of Sam’s knees. Dean’s expression was awkward; his usual mask of arrogant composure slipping at the sight of Sam’s dishevelled state. As his gaze travelled up to meet Sam’s, it seemed as if Dean was suddenly struck by something. Mouth dropping open in awe, eyes glazing with desire, Dean stepped into the room, leaving the door open as if forgotten.

Sam’s heart raced faster. Dean was focused on him with single-minded purpose and he couldn’t bring himself to do anything that would snap his brother out of it. He closed his eyes for a moment and licked his lips, nerves making his mouth dry. When he opened them Dean was there, hands hovering just millimetres above his skin, green eyes mindlessly worshipping him. Without thinking, Sam detached his hand from the cool surface of the wall and lifted it, palm grazing Dean’s cheek, thumb dragging down the plump, pink lower lip. Dean’s eyes fluttered closed and a breath of air brushed over Sam’s fingers as Dean gasped.

Dean’s hands finally made contact with his skin. One clasped Sam’s hand to his face, where he nuzzled against it. The other buried in Sam’s hair, bringing his head down, lips meeting Dean’s arched throat and resting there for a moment before he closed his eyes and sucked a bruising kiss into Dean’s skin. The moan that escaped Sam’s lips and met Dean’s flushed skin only seemed to spur Dean on harder, hips grinding into his own, forcing him back against the wall.

The tinny noise of Dean’s phone blasting out the opening strains of Metallica’s ‘Enter Sandman’ broke the two of them apart, chests heaving as they struggled to adjust to what had just happened.

“It’s Bobby.” Dean flipped the phone open and walked away, head low as if he was avoiding Sam’s eyes. “Uh huh… Yeah, yep… No shit… Okay, call me when you find it.”

The bed creaked under Dean’s weight as he flopped down onto it, hunched over so his elbows were on his knees and his head was in his hands.

Sam’s voice was croaky, “Did he find anything?”

Dean nodded, eyes still covered by his hands, words muffled as he explained what Bobby had told him. “The venom was meant to paralyse you. If he’d been able to hang onto you a little longer then you’d be on your way to his little lair or whatever right now. But the interruption, and the fact that I managed to suck some of it out meant you just got a small dose.”

“And?” He was impatient. Dean was stalling on the details.

“And you’re irresistible.” Dean sighed. Sam refrained from making some comment about how he’d known that all along and just waited for Dean to get the rest out. “The venom makes you like some kind of human catnip. Anyone who’s around you long enough to really make eye contact with you, hear your voice, smell your skin, they’re gonna lose it. You saw what it did to the waitress, to those guys in the alley. He‘s still working on how to get it out of your system.”

Neither of them mentioned what it had done to the two of them just moments before. Sam couldn’t bring himself to ask whether it had been the venom that had made him want it too. Judging by the too-loud silence coming from where Dean was sitting, Dean wasn’t about to discuss it any further.

~*~

Bobby’s next phone call came just a few hours later. Once he’d found out what the venom was, it hadn’t taken him long to track down the information they needed. Sam listened patiently to Dean’s end of the call, and waited for the explanation afterwards.

“He says it’ll be just a few more hours. It’ll wear off on its own.” Dean sounded relieved.

“No cure, no strange ritual or spell?” He was confused - these things usually needed at least one chalk-circle-weird-ingredients-Latin-phrased- ritual to get rid of them.

Dean started to turn towards him but seemed to think better of it. “’Til it wears off we need to keep you away from people. Even from me. I just can’t look at you or get too close and smell you, or even hear you. Bobby says if you talk for too long it’ll kick in. So…I’m gonna head out and get us something to eat, and maybe we can just settle down and watch a film, yeah?”

“Mmm” He grunted, not wanting to risk talking if it could have an effect on Dean again.

Dean slid him a piece of paper and he wrote down what he wanted from the diner, waiting until Dean had left before heading to the bathroom for a shower.

~*~

The food was ready much quicker than Dean had expected. He was in no rush to get back to the motel, but there wasn’t really anywhere else for him to go. He headed back to the room, psyching himself up for an evening of ignoring his not-so-little brother so that he wouldn’t be tempted to rip off Sam’s clothes and rub their naked bodies together. Something told him that was going to be harder than usual to resist temptation, especially since Dean never really did resist temptation if he could avoid it.

Opening the door with his eyes downcast, Dean listened for Sam’s movements in the room. When he didn’t hear anything he risked a glance upwards, the room was empty. The bathroom door was shut, though, and he guessed Sam was probably in there. He went over to knock on the door to let Sam know that he was back. The room was quite small, even for a motel, and it only took a few steps to reach the door. He lifted his fist just as the door opened and Sam walked out quickly, wrapped in a bigger than usual towel, and moving too fast for Dean to avoid. His hand impacted with Sam’s wet shoulder, the momentum of Sam’s steps pushing him back for a second so that he reached out to keep his balance.

Sam instinctively grabbed hold of him to stop him falling and Dean took in a deep breath, inhaling the smell of Sam’s damp skin, unwittingly locking eyes with him and instantly losing the ability to remember why fucking his brother would be a bad thing. His fingers clung to hot, wet skin and suddenly he wanted more. Sam’s lips were just a few inches away, a gap he closed without thinking, hungrily taking a sucking, bruising kiss that seemed to knock Sam off balance. Sam’s body twisted around his and they stumbled to the edge of the bed, lips still crushed together. Dean’s tongue invaded Sam’s mouth possessively, teeth clashing a little in his haste.

Big hands came up to pull him in tight, hands that could have easily fought him off, but didn’t. Sam dragged him down to the bed, falling underneath ravenous kisses until Dean was on top of him, pinning him to the bed. Dean couldn’t get enough of Sam’s body, the feel of his skin, the taste of him. Biting, sucking, marking perfect skin, hands fisting in long brown curls of hair.

Vaguely, at the back of his mind, something told him this wasn’t right. He shouldn’t be forcing himself on his brother like this, but Sam was far from unwilling. In fact, Sam was kissing him back, hands dragging at his clothes, ripping open his shirt. They were grinding against each other like teenagers - friction almost but not quite enough, yet too good to stop moving together for even a second.

There was no time for finesse or slow, smouldering glances. All Dean could feel was a raw, primal urge to get inside Sam and fuck him hard. His dick was harder than ever, rubbing against his worn boxer briefs, pre-come leaking out already to seep into the fabric. Sam’s towel had slipped off already, but Dean’s clothes were annoyingly in the way. He didn’t want to have to pull back to get them off, but they couldn’t get any closer without being naked. Sam’s fingers were clawing at his shirt and he let it get tugged up over his head before quickly pulling back to undo his fly. He shucked off his boots and yanked down his jeans and underwear all in one go, barely letting them fall from his ankles before he was back on top of Sam.

Dean prided himself on a certain level of attention to detail when it came to sex, but with Sam naked underneath him and the spell of the Incubus venom holding him in its sway, he was unable to do much more than rut against Sam. Luckily Sam didn’t seem to have a problem with that, hips bucking up against Dean’s frantic thrusts, eyes closed, bottom lip bitten between his teeth.

One of Dean’s hands was buried in Sam’s hair, the other slid around from cupping his ass to grip their hard cocks together, jerking them roughly against each other. Sam’s cries spurred him on harder, the fast, tight tug of his hand between them almost painful in its intensity. All around him he could hear Sam‘s frantic breaths, and a sound like a muted angel‘s chorus, ebbing and flowing with their movements. He sucked deep pink marks into the skin of Sam’s throat, feeling the pulse racing there beneath this skin, and Sam’s ragged breathing against his ear. Sam’s arms were wrapped around him so tightly he could barely breathe, but he didn’t care.

Quickly Dean found himself reaching the edge of orgasm, his body was begging him to carry on, but the urge to be inside Sam was stronger. It wasn’t enough to just waste this moment, touching and rubbing like this was good, but he wanted to be under Sam’s skin, closer than ever before. Reluctantly he let go and eased back out of Sam’s grasp onto his knees, between long, tanned thighs. Sam‘s skin seemed to glow in the low light of the dingy room. He shook his head to clear it, but everything stayed the same. Sam gave him a wide-eyed look, as if he was wondering how they’d managed to get so far so quickly.

The skin of Sam’s chest and throat was covered in little red marks and his lips were kiss-swollen and parted. Dean’s fingers were slipping between those lips before he could remember why then reaching down between Sam’s legs to circle against his hole. One pushing a little too hard in his haste and popping past the tight ring of muscle, making Sam hiss and contract around it. Dean’s cock throbbed with want as he pushed his spit-slick finger deeper inside. Sam reached out with one hand, grasped a bottle of lube and a condom out of his duffel, and tossed them at Dean.

He was too intently focused on the job at hand to wonder exactly when and more importantly _why_ Sam had brought lube. The stuff was cold against his fingers, and it would be even colder for Sam, but it would warm up quickly and Dean was too impatient to wait. Sam hissed again as the cold liquid hit him, clenching around Dean’s finger to the point that Dean couldn’t even twist it until Sam relaxed a fraction.

He prepped Sam quickly, ruthlessly and only just enough, before pulling on the condom, covering himself with a generous layer of lube and lining up against Sam’s hole. Long legs were splayed wide before him, Sam reached past them and grabbed Dean’s ass in both hands, pulling him in until the head of his cock pushed just inside the tight hole. Sam made a kind of grunting noise that would normally have been something of a turn off, but the sound of his voice and the fluttering of his muscles around Dean’s cock only got Dean harder. Despite the obvious pain Sam was feeling, his hands kept up pressure on Dean’s ass, pulling him in tighter until he was buried deep inside.

Sam let go of Dean with one hand to reach down and stroke himself, relaxing a little as he touched himself. Dean was mesmerized by the sheer size of Sam‘s hand, wrapped around his own dick, long fingers easily meeting his palm despite the thickness of his erection. Sam’s moans harmonized with the quiet chorus of singing that Dean could still hear. He shifted into a better position, grasped Sam’s hips, and began to thrust hard, pulling Sam against him with every thrust.

Sam’s legs wrapped around Dean’s waist to pull him in tighter, and the moment his brother’s ankles locked around the small of his back, Dean suddenly snapped out of the venom-spell. The rush of blood to his head was dizzying, the room came into sharp focus, the glow from Sam’s skin receding until it was just Sam again, just his brother lying beneath him. The soft singing he’d been hearing ebbed away until he could only hear their ragged breaths. Sam writhed below him, soft skin marred with bite-marks, red lines where Dean had dragged blunt fingernails against him, pink bruises sucked into his collarbone. The marks that had been so hot, so sexy to make were suddenly just sickening evidence of what he‘d done, of his own weakness.

“Fuck!” Dean gasped, falling forward, reaching out just in time to brace himself.

Sam’s free hand came up to grasp the back of Dean’s head, “What? What is it?” He panted, freezing immediately and locking eyes with Dean.

“What are we doing?” He was still buried deep inside Sam, dick still traitorously hard. Although the touch of Sam’s skin was no longer the only thing he craved, it was still pretty perfect, strangely satisfying. Even as he began to freak out about what they were doing, he was aching to move, to just fuck Sam until they physically couldn’t do it anymore. “Did I…?”

“No, Dean, it’s okay. I wanted…” Sam’s frown brought out the tiny wrinkles in his forehead, and Dean couldn’t help it, he reached up to touch them, to smooth them away. Sam’s hand dropped from the back of his neck and grabbed Dean’s wrist, pulling it down to his lips. “Please?”

They’d gone this far. Sam was already split wide open, moments from coming all over his own fist, impaled on Dean’s cock. What difference would it really make if they finished what they started? He wondered for a moment whether they’d be welcome in Heaven again after what he was about to do to his brother. A little grin tugged at his lips as he began to realize that he didn’t care anymore. Sam was too important. He’d gone to Hell once for his brother. He’d do it again if he had to.

The first slide and push of his hips made Sam gasp again, and although the venom-haze had lifted, Dean still thought it was one of the sexiest sounds he’d ever heard. The movement of Sam’s hand between them, jerking himself hard and fast, drew Dean’s attention. Sam was so hot like this, needy, tendons in his forearms bunching and flexing as he twisted his wrist at the end of each stroke. Sam’s knees clenched tight around Dean’s waist, making it hard to breathe for a second, as Sam shuddered, cried out Dean’s name, and came in thick, white stripes across his own chest.

The moment Sam dragged his fingers through the warm liquid and lifted them for Dean to suck, he felt his orgasm inevitably building. Sam’s muscles spasmed around him, and he opened up to taste the come that was being offered to him. It was smeared across his lips and over his tongue with Sam’s enthusiastic gesture. It tasted…like come. He’d have loved to pretend it was like nectar from the gods, it was just come, though. All the same, it was Sam’s, and that simple, pure evidence of what they were doing tipped him over the edge. His fingers clawed deeper into the meat of Sam’s hips as he slammed his hips to a stuttering, intense finish, coming hard but silently, breath caught in his throat.

Dean’s legs were weak as he rolled off, only just remembering to hold onto the edges of the condom as he pulled out. He collapsed next to Sam, breathing hard, sleep threatening to overwhelm his body. Sam’s arm snuck out to pull him in tight, and they both drifted off, clammy skin pressed together under a thin layer of sweat.

~*~

Sam woke to find Dean’s face buried in his neck, one arm and leg slung over him. He was covered in drying come, sheets sticking to their bodies and still damp with their sweat. Dean’s usual light snoring was missing, and he realized that Dean was awake, suddenly making him a little tense, afraid to move.

“Hey.” Dean mumbled against his skin.

“Hey.” His throat was dry and rough.

“So this isn’t awkward at all.” Dean rolled away a little, hand still resting on Sam’s belly, but he was far back enough now that they could look at each other.

Sam grinned nervously, “Yeah, totally normal.” He sat up in the bed, watching as Dean pulled the sheets up around them, as if conscious of their nakedness. “Dean, what happened…? I…I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have… shouldn’t have let it go that far.”

“What?” Dean’s eyes narrowed, “In case you’ve forgotten, Sam, I was the one with my dick in your ass.”

Sam winced, “Yeah, alright. No need to remind me.” He shifted on the bed, the ache in his legs and ass a reminder of what they’d done together. “That wasn’t what I meant and you know it.”

Dean sighed, rubbing a hand over his face and pinning Sam with an exasperated gaze, “You think you took advantage of me or something? You think I didn’t want this?”

Sam nodded, too afraid to elaborate on his feelings, Dean had the essence of it right. When his brother began to laugh, Sam he felt a burst of anger rising in his chest. “What? Is this funny to you, Dean? This whole fucking situation‘s just a bunch of laughs, huh?”

“No,” He sighed, “no, it’s just…you just don’t get it, do you? You think the only reason I wanted to get on you was because of the venom.”

Sam nodded even though it wasn’t a question. Dean knew him well enough, he was stating the facts.

“Sam…” Slowly, Dean reached for his brother, pulling him back down so they were lying together, face to face. “I wanted it, okay? I guess I could have resisted if I wanted to. Been resisting you long enough, Sammy. I just…I didn’t want to anymore.”

“Dean..?”

Dean’s fingers were strong and warm on the back of his neck, pulling him in to a soft, reassuring kiss. “Been resisting you since you were seventeen. You hit that last real growth spurt, remember?” Sam nodded, remembering how he’d suddenly grown so tall that only an old pair of Dean’s wrecked jeans that had always been a little too long would fit him. “You had those jeans of mine that were all fucked around the knees and ass. You remember I couldn’t keep my hands off them? Kept teasing you about it?”

“I thought you wanted them back.” Sam couldn’t help the nostalgic smile spreading across his face.

“I wanted you out of them. That’s all I wanted.” The sparkle was back in Dean’s eyes, he looked happier than he had for a long time.

Sam grinned sheepishly, “Dean, I got a confession of my own.” Dean gave him a raised eyebrow, fingers still stroking the back of his neck. “I had other jeans. Ones that fitted, I mean. I bought them with my pool-hustling money.”

The puzzled look on Dean’s face was adorable, “So…?”

“So I wanted to wear yours.”

Dean closed his eyes and grinned, “If you wanted to get in my pants you just had to say, Sammy.” And Sam let the nickname slide, knowing it was a mark of Dean’s affection, even if he did hate it.

“Yeah, I coulda said something, but that would’ve spoiled the fun.” He gazed at Dean, remembering how not long after that growth spurt he’d left them for Stanford. Suddenly he realized that his life could have taken a completely different direction if he’d just lived out his plans, stayed there and ignored Dean’s pleas to help him find Dad that time. “You know, I don’t even know where I’d be right now…”

“Huh?” Dean looked sleepy again, slumping down to rest on Sam’s shoulder.

“If you hadn’t come back for me, where I’d be, what I’d be doing.” He faltered, unable to imagine a life without Dean.

“You’d have found me. Whatever this thing is between us, Sam, we can’t be apart too long. It just doesn’t work. You know?” Sam nodded, tension in his chest easing, as Dean’s words filled him with certainty, certainty about their relationship, about how much he meant to his brother. Dean‘s voice was quiet and lazy as he mumbled, “You know, your fine’s gone way up now. In fact, I think there’s probably a whole new level of fine for what we just did.” Before settling in to sleep again.

~*~

After a lazy morning in bed, they slowly came back to reality and to the realization that now Sam could go out in public again. The venom had burnt off and they were able to go after the Incubus again. Another quick phone call to Bobby and they had a way to kill the thing, and more motivation than ever.

Similar to the siren, the thing could only be killed by a knife that was anointed with the blood of someone who was infected by the incubus’s bite. The knife needed to be iron, and they had plenty of those. What they didn’t have was an infected person. The venom had worn out of Sam’s system. They’d have to try their luck when they found the thing and hope that they could get to a victim before they were confronted with the Incubus. Bobby also warned them that the thing wouldn’t be easy to kill, Dean would have to get it in the heart to cause it any real damage, and if they didn’t want it re-incarnating, they had to decapitate it too. To make it even more difficult, Sam was probably going to be something of a liability on the hunt too, because the Incubus could sense Sam’s movements and intentions more easily, because he had once been infected with the venom.

As much as Sam wanted to be the one to ram that knife home, this one was all on Dean. Instead he concentrated on finding the thing, searching through the news reports for towns within a radius they assumed he would have been limited to in the timeframe since Sam’s attack. The thing was likely to be travelling on foot, since supernatural creatures could rarely stand to be encased in iron for very long. Especially when it was one of the ones that was susceptible to it.

There were three missing person’s reports in the last two days within a two-hundred mile radius. Two were young people, close enough together that their disappearances could have been related. The other one was an elderly man, which didn’t fit the monster’s usual victim type. It could have been a ruse to cover his tracks, but Dean was convinced that the two missing youngsters were closer to where the thing was.

“It needs to feed, Sam. They live off the life force of the people they take. An old guy like that’s not going to give it much energy.” Dean leaned over Sam’s shoulder, pointing at the article on the laptop screen. The local news for the town said the man was almost eighty years old, and from the photo he looked quite frail.

“I just can’t help thinking that he wouldn’t be as obvious as to take two more people just a hundred miles up the road from here. It must have known we were hunters, right?” Sam gave him a worried look that had Dean’s stomach tensing, fists curling inevitably with his desire to just kill the damn thing.

“I don’t know, Sam. Maybe it was going to attack you anyway and I just startled it. But I think it’s gonna **need** two young victims like this - its energy is bound to be low after running from us like that. And it doesn’t know that you didn’t get the full dose of venom, that I sucked some of it out. It probably thinks we’re still dealing with the after-effects. We need to move now, though, before it moves again.”

Sam nodded and laced his fingers with Dean’s where they lay on the table before him. Dean pulled him up into a quick but deep kiss, turning him in the chair so that for once he was the one reaching up to kiss his brother. They both wanted more but there was no time to waste, and if they got this done they could spend all the time they wanted holed up somewhere else, getting to know each other even more intimately than they already did.

~*~

The missing kids lived in two towns that were only really separate in name. In reality the towns bordered one another and the housing on the outskirts merged together, making it an almost seamless transit from one to the other. This time, though, there seemed to be no links between the two kids. They were just a boy and a girl, young and happy kids, no problems in school. They were a little younger than the college kids in the last town, but not so young that they wouldn’t have been attracted to the Incubus in the right situation.

Dean started off interviewing the kids at one of the schools, but none of them seemed to know anything. He found out that the two kids probably didn’t know each other, but that they’d both disappeared on the same day. The teachers assumed it was some kind of secret romance, but Dean made sure to speak to the girl’s best friends and found out that she had been really into her boyfriend, an older guy, who played on her school’s football team.

The second school was the same. The teachers assumed some teenage love affair was responsible for the fact that the boy was missing. However his friends and classmates were more worried, knowing that he didn’t have any relationship with the girl, and worried that they were going to be next. None of them had seen anyone matching the description of the Incubus, but Dean didn’t know if the thing could change form. Bobby’s research hadn’t turned up any information on that.

Sam called him from outside the house of one of the parents. He’d spoken to them all, but only one of them remembered something of interest. There was a new waiter at the waffle place in town, the one that all the kids hung out at, that matched the description Sam gave them of the Incubus. They both figured it was too much of a coincidence. Either the thing couldn’t change form or its energy source was too depleted to try it now.

They arranged to meet near the waffle house. This time Dean didn’t have to remind Sam not to go in there without him, they didn’t need a repeat of the last time they’d been close to catching this thing.

~*~

Sam waited anxiously on the corner, a block down from the waffle place - _Ed‘s waffle and grill shack >. This close to the Incubus he could feel the edges of the closed-up wound at his neck beginning to throb a little. He could only hope that either the thing couldn’t feel it too, or it would be overwhelmed by the proximity of his other victims. Had to hope that the victims were stored close by, otherwise they had no chance of defeating it._

The local kids were flooding in and out of the place now; it was about an hour after the schools let out. Sam watched them wandering in laughing, nervously flirting. Their innocence and youth would be intoxicating to the creature. He felt a strong urge to just get in there and destroy the thing, rip its head off if he had to, but he knew he couldn’t win this fight alone.

Dean showed up a few minutes later, grim determination settling on his face. They scoped the place out for a while, sharing what they’d learned through the day. As they watched, most of the kids began to dissipate, heading back home before their parents began to miss them. They held back a little longer and in a stroke of luck, the new waiter headed out not long after the kids left. They watched him leave and made a quick plan. Dean would follow him back to whatever lair the thing had set up, and Sam would check out the waffle and grill for any signs of the missing kids.

Sam’s suit was a little crumpled, and his health inspector ID wouldn’t have stood up to close inspection, but they’d always known that a confident attitude and a little intimidation would get them far. He was in the waffle house’s kitchen before the owner even had time to remember that their last inspection had only been six weeks before.

The place was clean enough, but Sam could sense traces of the Incubus’s venom in some places. He checked out the kitchen and the cold room, there were no signs of the kids. Just as he was about to give up and head out, he felt a tingle again, there was definitely something there.

Moving towards the back of the kitchen, Sam found a small door he’d missed the first time round. It was locked, but only with a simple mechanism that he could pick quickly. He was through the door in a minute, and faced with a dark set of stairs. The light wasn’t working but he had a small torch inside his jacket pocket that cast enough light for him to get down the creaky old stairs. The weak light of the small torch pushed back the shadows a little until Sam’s eyes adjusted to the darkness.

Piles of boxes littered the floor, some piled as high as the basement’s ceiling. The raw brickwork was covered in thick webs, and in places there were weeds poking through the walls. The place seemed empty; nevertheless Sam could feel an even stronger pull toward the venom now. He was drawn to one large pile of boxes, listening carefully until he heard the labored breathing coming from behind the boxes.

Quickly, he tore them down, not caring about the noise it made as they fell to the floor. Many of them were empty and came away easily, revealing a young girl, bound hand and foot, barely conscious. She was tightly gagged, the cloth pulling her lips taut over her teeth. She was alone. Perhaps the creature was keeping one at work and one at home, a quick snack whenever he needed it. Sam untied the girl and fired off a quick text to Dean to let him know the score.

The girl’s wound had stayed open, probably because the creature kept feeding from her. Sam was able to take a little blood from her without causing her too much discomfort, before bandaging her up as best he could. He wiped it over his own knife and bundled the thing away just in case anyone saw it. He had the choice of carrying the girl out into the kitchen, or leaving her there and calling in an anonymous tip-off later. The human in him wanted to drag her out of there immediately, get her into the light and where she could be helped, but the hunter in him told him to get out of there and get her help once he was clear.

Leaving her there was one of the hardest things he’d had to do in a long time, but he promised himself he would get her help as soon as he could. He had to hope that the venom wouldn‘t have the same effect on the law enforcement that it did on the people around him after he‘d been bitten. He hoped it would have worn off enough by now that she wouldn‘t suffer the same sort of attacks.

Getting past Ed, the owner, was no mean feat. He made up something about an infestation and got out of there as quickly as he could. A few blocks down the road he found a phone box and placed an anonymous call to the cops, tipping them off to check out Ed’s basement. He waited until the cop car came before heading off to meet up with Dean.

~*~

The house was fairly small but looked nice enough. Certainly not the desolate shack that Dean had been expecting. He watched the creature enter the house, sent a message to Sam with the address, and crept to the windows to peer through a gap in the blinds. The house looked normal inside too. He could see the Incubus removing his apron and shirt, stretching out cramped-looking muscles that roiled beneath his skin. The creature’s skin took on a grey hue, face lengthening, fangs growing in the thing’s jaw.

The thing began to make its way upstairs and Dean made a decision to get inside. The door was already unlocked, which should have given him a warning. He moved inside cautiously, keeping an eye out for the missing kids. He’d only taken a few steps when he heard a whooshing noise from above, the creature swooped down and landed on top of him, knocking him to the floor. Dean started to struggle but the thing had him pinned and darted in to bite at his neck. For a second he felt the sting of sharp fangs sinking into his skin, the venom raging into his veins, before the room spun and disappeared into darkness.

~*~

Dean awoke tied to a bed, next to the missing boy. He was bound at the wrists and ankles, a soft but tight gag pulled across his mouth. The wound on his neck was a stabbing, sharp pain that clawed into his skin, the venom seeping through his blood and heating his body, making him drip with sweat and keeping him unnaturally drowsy. Sam had slept for hours after getting attacked, but by the light in the room and the fact that Sam wasn’t yet there, he figured he hadn’t been out for long. Next to him, the boy writhed and cried out in his sleep, no doubt locked in a deep, dark dream.

He tested the ropes that held him tight to the bed. The creature knew how to tie knots, and there was nothing nearby that he could use to weaken the rope. He strained to look around the room, head swimming as he did. It was too dark to make out much, but he managed to work out where the door and window were. There were no other exits and there was nothing that he could see to use as a weapon. He could only hope that his various hidden knives and box cutters were still in their hiding places or that Sam was on the way and more prepared than he’d been.

The boy next to him began to shake, eyes fluttering open as he awoke. Dean suddenly struggled against a wave of drowsiness, using all his energy to keep himself awake, but the groggy feeling overwhelmed him and he plunged back into the blackness just as the boy came fully awake.

~*~

Dean was nowhere to be found. The house was dark and seemed empty. Sam found it hard to believe that Dean would go in alone, knowing how he’d been mad at Sam for the exact same thing. All the same, Dean wasn’t answering his phone, and even though the Impala was here, Dean was not. Sam took a deep breath and closed his eyes, trying to sense whether he could feel the creature inside, whether his venom-bite would tingle at all. He felt the presence of something in there, but it was similar to when he’d found the girl - it felt like a victim, not like the Incubus itself.

The longer he waited, the more he worried about the situation. If Dean was there then he’d either been incapacitated or he was in some kind of fight with the creature. That thought sealed his decision and he crept around the back of the house, breaking in as quietly as he could through the kitchen door. The house was quiet, but the feeling of being drawn to the victim was stronger again inside. He stayed low and quiet, creeping through the house until he felt the pull towards one of the bedrooms.

The rooms were all clear except this last one. He braced himself and kept his blood-infused knife at the ready, easing the door open with his foot to keep his hands free to fight. Nothing came at him and he still didn’t feel the creature nearby. In the dim, early evening light, he caught sight of two figures, tied to a bed in the corner. One was quietly whimpering, the other was Dean. Even in the dark like this, without really being able to hear or see, he knew his brother straight away.

He moved quickly to the bed and began to shake his brother, “Dean, wake up! Dean please, please, wake up!” He hissed urgently. It was no use, though. Dean was out cold.

The boy began to whimper. “Please help us! He’ll be back soon. Never stays out for long at night.” Sam nodded and sliced at the ropes binding the boy’s wrists, giving him a small knife so he could free his own ankles.

Sam chopped at the ropes at Dean’s hands and feet, and pulled down the gag. Dean’s skin was wet and pale, veins darkly visible under the surface. The boy was up already, the venom possibly working out of his system. Sam could see that he’d only been bitten once. He didn’t stop to wonder why the venom effects weren’t working on him; he assumed he must have an immunity to it now.

The kid wanted to run but Sam had to convince him they were better off together. He quickly explained that he knew how to kill the Incubus, and persuaded the boy to help him with Dean. They hefted Dean up with his arms over their shoulders, Sam bearing most of the weight, and walked him out into the hallway and down the stairs.

Just as they reached the bottom, Sam heard a key turn in the lock. He lowered Dean to the stairs and put a finger to his lips to warn the boy to stay quiet. The door opened just as Sam got into position behind it. The creature came in and Sam watched him take a couple of alarmed steps, reaching the bottom of the stairs. The thing was about to reach out and attack his victims again when Sam leapt out from behind the door and rammed the long, blood-infused knife home. It slipped under the creatures ribs, the tip coming to rest where the thing’s heart would be. The Incubus howled and turned in a heartbeat, trying to rip the knife from Sam’s grasp but it stayed embedded in his side.

When he’d first seen the creature it had been in the form of a beautiful, golden-skinned man. Now the thing was more monster than human, huge black eyes and a gaping maw full of fangs, grey skin, writhing as if there were snakes underneath it. He could feel that the thing was a little weaker as he grappled with it, but he hadn’t got his strike in deep enough to really catch the heart, it seemed. He must have just nicked it. The creature fought him move for move, and he knew that if it didn’t have the knife buried in its side then he would have already been dead.

Just as the creature began to get the better of him, Sam caught a glimpse of Dean standing up shakily, swaying behind the thing. He gave it one last shot, holding the Incubus as still as he could and as far away from himself as possible. Dean seemed to get it together for a second, reached forward and yanked out the knife. The creature howled again and began to turn, just as Dean lunged forward and buried the knife deep between its ribs. For a moment they were frozen there, but as the creature slid back, Dean fell forward and landed on top of it. The Incubus’s howls became gurgling coughs, back arching, skin blackening and hardening. Quickly it had become a sort of leather shell of what it had been, wrinkled and black.

Sam yanked out the knife and stared as the corpse deteriorated further, curling in on itself, hands clawed and mouth wide open in a rictus of agony.

“The head, Sam.” Dean’s voice was rough and quiet, but urgent. Sam nodded and grabbed the thing, surprised at how light it was. He pinned it to the floor and hacked off the head in one clean sweep, kicking it away from the body before falling back against the wall to catch his breath.

~*~

For once, Sam was driving the Impala. They’d dropped off the boy outside his home, not staying to explain to his parents what had happened. They hoped the boy would be clever enough not to mention them, but they weren’t about to risk it. They left town as fast as they could.

Driving over the dark, rural roads, Sam kept an eye and one hand on Dean at all times. It was hard to believe that just a few days ago they’d been playing around, teasing each other about their stupid fines and what they had and hadn’t done. It seemed like a lifetime ago. But that was their life together, one minute they were joking and laughing, the next they were skipping town after beheading yet another creepy monster.

As Dean’s hand reached down to entwine his fingers with Sam’s, one thing was certain, their lives had changed. Sam already knew that it was for the better.

 

 **Link to art:** [here](http://kasmodia.livejournal.com/32582.html)


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